Lamingtons, yummy!

Since being a full time stay at home mum I've gotten excited about cooking and baking (I think I already mentioned that..). Anywho we spend family home evening every Monday, which means no TV and quality time with the family, fun and games and treats of course. Last weeks Monday I made lamingtons for us. They are very Aussi and I've never done them before, but let me tell you: very easy and so tasty.

This is how you do them:

1/2 cup self-raising flour
1/2 cup plain flour
1/2 cup corn flour
6 eggs (room temperature)
1 cup sugar
1 tbs boiling water

Chocolate icing

2 cups icing sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup boiling water

and desiccated coconut to roll the pieces


1. Reheat oven to 160°C. Use a 20 x 30cm pan and line the base and sides with baking paper, allowing it to overhang slightly.

2. Combine the flours and sift them into a large bowl. Repeat twice.

3. Use an electric beater to whisk the eggs in a large clean, dry bowl until thick and pale. Gradually add the sugar, 1 tbs at a time, whisking well after each addition until mixture is thick and sugar dissolves.

4. Sift the combined flours over the egg mixture. Pour the boiling water down the side of the bowl. Use a large metal spoon to gently fold until just combined. Pour mixture into the prepared pan. Bake in oven for 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Turn cake onto a wire rack, cover with a clean tea towel and set aside to cool.

5. Cut the cake into 15 squares.

6. To make the chocolate icing, sift the icing sugar and cocoa powder into a medium bowl. Add the milk and water and stir until smooth.

7. Dip 1 cake square into the warm icing and roll onto all sides to evenly coat. Allow any excess icing to drip off. Then roll the cake in the coconut to evenly coat and place on a wire rack. Repeat with the remaining cake squares, icing and coconut. Set aside for 1 hour or until icing sets.



And there you go. So basicly you make a sponge cake and cut it in pieces and then cover it with some icing sugar mix and coconut. There's a few tricks though to make a successful sponge cake:

a) make sure that the eggs are at room temperature
b) preheat the oven, it's important that the oven is hot when you put the cake mixture in it
c) do not open the oven in the middle of baking the cake




And those in Finland who want to try this, 1 cup is about 2,5 dl, and instead of self-raising flour you have to use normal flour and then add about 3 tsp of baking powder.

Have fun baking!

My wonderful nieces

I adore my nieces. They are the most fun to be around. The two oldest ones are born a bit over a year apart and the two last ones are the same. Because of this they are best friends who also fight a lot. I love spending time with them and I love them so much. One of the things I miss most about Finland is these girls.

So I want to make them heaps of scrapbooking pages of all the memories I have with them. I've already made one while back, but just before we left Finland I made these:

I'm pretty pleased with the way they turned out. And if any of you girls or your mother reads this, know that I love you!!

Family time

We did a family trip to the wave rock last Sunday.

Nature is so amazing. 

The way rocks are shaped.

All the little creatures

and the sunset.

Amazing.

Something made awhile ago

I love reading blogs and one awesome blog is Noodlehead (if you haven't seen her blog yet, go and have a look, she just made an amazing jacket for a little boy). A while ago (well fine, actually a long time ago) she posted this tutorial and as soon as I saw it I knew I just had to try it and make one. So here's the result:

I made a few things a bit different but it still looks like hers. And I like it so much that I'd want to make a whole bunch of these! I just don't know what to do with them all if I made them. This one went to one of my dear friend as a valentines present (though it was suppose to be a birthday present sent last year, sorry..)

Hope you all a very good weekend and I'll be back with more photos for the project 365 very shortly.

I'm back

Yay! It's so good to be back here again. I've been waiting for this for a long time (yes I call nearly two months a long time). The first reason why I haven't been blogging is because we went

from this

to this

Yep, moving and packing took all my time and even though I tried packing my sewing machine and all the fabric last I just didn't have any time to do anything else but get things sorted out. And then it was time to fly out of Finland and go move all the way to the other side of the world.

I was excited because I knew that all I had was time after we landed and I could continue blogging and doing crafty things. Well things don't always work out the way you think. So the second reason why I haven't been able to blog is that we didn't have an internet connection for a month and I just got the sewing machine to borrow yesterday.

But the awesome thing is that because of this I've gotten excited in cooking and baking! Hubby has been grateful because I've made his lunch for work and I have spent so much time with Emma and that has been absolutely wonderful!

And now some changes...

I've been thinking about this blog and it's purpose and I have come to the conclusion that from now on I will post also things about our family life here in Australia (since I hope few of my family and friends will be following what we are up to this way). I will continue posting also crafty things and also pictures for the project 365. But I want to make this blog also about motherhood and especially living in a different culture. We'll see how I go.

Also you've probably noticed that I'm not writing in Finnish anymore.. I hope this is ok for everyone, it just took too much time to write in both so I thought this way is easier. But can't wait to show you more of us. So see you soon!

Merja